Written in the 1840s and published here for the first time Julia Ward Howesnovel about a hermaphrodite is unlike anything of its timeor in truth ofour own. Narr... » 

Written in the 1840s and published here for the first time Julia Ward Howesnovel about a hermaphrodite is unlike anything of its timeor in truth ofour own. Narrated by Laurence who is raised and lives as a man and is loved bymen and women alike yet can respond to neither this unconventional storyexplores the realization that fervent hearts must borrow the disguise of artif they would win the right to express in any outward form the internal firethat consumes them. Laurence describes his repudiation by his family hisinvolvement with an attractive widow his subsequent wanderings and eventualattachment to a sixteenyearold boy his own tutelage by a Roman nobleman andhis sisters and his ultimate reunion with his early love. His is a storyunique in nineteenthcentury American letters at once a remarkable reflectionof a largely hidden inner life and a richly imagined tale of comingofage atodds with ones culture. «